Head of Procurement - Wholesale Plumbing and Heating

Skills & Experience Minimum 8 years in senior purchasing and procurement leadership roles, ideally within technical or industrial sectors, with a track record of driving double-digit growthProven leadership skills to inspire and motivate procurement team. Excellent interpersonal and communication skills essential for building client relationships.Deep understanding of modern procurement processes, including product identification, negotiation, and closing techniques. Strong analytical and IT skills to interpret data and make timely and informed strategy decisions. Notable achievements in margin management, strategic planning, and market expansion.Responsibilities Develop and execute procurement strategy for the Irish plumbing, heating and bathroom product categories. Lead strategic activities to identify, source and quality test new products, ensuring they align to commercial objectives, customer demand, and brand reputation. Own category performance through sourcing plans, supplier capacity management, and continuous product optimisation. Build and maintain long-established, trusted supplier relationships. Lead commercial negotiations to secure excellent product pricing and transport costs, financial terms, lead times, and manufacturer quality guarantees. Support attendance at international trade shows where you will negotiate and manage supplier discussions face-to-face across all aspects of procurement. Manage stock quantity levels and lead times to ensure product availability. Coordinate supply resilience across seasonal demand peaks, particularly managing procurement and replenishment from UK, Europe and China. Monitor and respond to supply chain risks that affect continuity of supply, lead times, and product lifecycle timing. Collaborate with senior internal stakeholders to support the end-to-end flow of goods, including; logistics planning, distribution, slow moving SKU’s, delivery performance and warehousing requirements. Ensure procurement aligns with warehousing capacity and distribution schedules. Fully responsible for importer/distributor compliance requirements to ensure all products have essential EU certifications and meet relevant plumbing/heating sector regulations.Ensure suppliers can demonstrate sustainable and ethical sourcing practices. Bring in-depth knowledge of plumbing, heating and bathroom furniture categories, with the ability to manage product-related queries and commercial decisions confidently. Manage the technical support staff in our training and testing department. Demonstrate willingness and motivation to develop product knowledge further to maintain credibility with internal stakeholders and suppliers. Provide technical input where needed to support selection, specification, and issue resolution.